Catch, Knox College's student-run literary magazine, has been selected as a finalist for the 2016 Associated Collegiate Press Magazine Pacemaker Award.

The Pacemaker Award is regarded as one of the highest honors in the field of student journalism.

"Having an organization like ACP single out Catch as a finalist for this year's Pacemaker award is a real honor," said Chad Simpson, associate professor of English and faculty advisor to Catch. "I know how many hours the editor and staff members put into each issue, for very little money, and it's great when someone from the outside recognizes the amazing work that the students do."

The Associated Collegiate Press said judges selected 22 Pacemaker finalists, including Catch's spring 2016 issue, from a total of 96 entries.

"Many entries stood out with high-quality design and content," the ACP said on its website. "Judges looked for strong covers—ones with eye-catching photography, sharp design, personality and intrigue. Simple, clean design went a long way, as did professionalism. One of the judges said several entries were so excellent they could imagine them sitting on retail shelves among other professional magazines."

Kelly Clare '16, Catch editor for the 2015-16 academic year, noted that the magazine from Knox was chosen as a Pacemaker finalist over magazines from larger schools, "which is to say that Catch, a truly student-run journal, is successfully competing amid a diverse spread of publications."

"An incredible amount of care is poured into any edition of Catch, and I was so proud to send out an e-mail to these people I've spent long days and longer nights working alongside, to tell them that the spring book was selected by the ACP," Clare added.

Award winners will be announced in October at the Associated Collegiate Press National College Media Convention in Washington, D.C.

Catch has a long tradition of being recognized for literary excellence, winning numerous national and international awards. They include the 2014 National Program Directors' Prize from the Association of Writers and Writing Programs and International Pacemaker Awards from the Associated Collegiate Press in 2008, 2005, and 2003.

Last year, Catch was one of five undergraduate magazine finalists for the Associated Collegiate Press 2015 Magazine Pacemaker Award.

Knox College has published a student-run literary journal for more than 100 years, which makes Catch the country's oldest continuously published literary journal. The genres of work published in Catch vary widely. In the past, they have included fiction, non-fiction, poetry, visual art, drama, journalism, music, theatrical design, and translations.

Simpson said he thinks of Catch "as a kind of archive of the best creative and scholarly work being made at Knox each year."

"Each issue that gets produced isn't just going to be read by many of the faculty and students at Knox; it's going to be placed on the shelves in the library and the publications office beside all of the other issues of Catch that have been made," he added. "It's no small task, curating the college's best work so that it can be added to that decades-old archive filled with work by so many passionate and brilliant students."